Tag Archives: Group: United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF)

United States Commission on International Religious Freedom: Reports of pre-election violence, combined with rising societal and political tensions, increase the likelihood of religiously-motivated violence around Nigeria’s February 14 presidential elections, warns the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF).

Huffington Post: Seven religious freedom advocates have offered to personally receive 100 lashes each in the place of Raif Badawi, a liberal Saudi blogger sentenced to 1,000 lashes and 10 years in prison for “insulting Islam through electronic channels.”

USCIRF Press Release: The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) today commemorates International Religious Freedom Day, marking the 16th anniversary of the passage of the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 (IRFA).

CNSNews: Princeton University Jurisprudence Professor Robert George, the newly-elected chairman of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, is a leading Catholic thinker and ethicist, but homosexuality advocacy groups are unhappy about the position going to an opponent of same-sex marriage.

Religion Clause Blog: The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom last week issued a statement (full text) strongly criticizing the Kuwaiti Parliament’s recent passage of a bill imposing strong penalties– including the death penalty in some cases– for blasphemy.

Christian Post: “The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom wants the government to use Wednesday’s United Nations Security Council meeting on Iraq as an ‘opportunity’ to address the ‘grave situation facing that country’s Christians and other imperiled religious minorities.’” | USCIRF press release is here.

ChristianNewsWire: “Founding members of ‘Coptic Solidarity,’ coming from the U.S., Canada, Australia and Europe, held their conference on June 19-20, at Virginia, USA., to launch the activities of the new organization. … A large number of presentations and discussions, focused on concrete future actions, took place during the first day of the conference. Besides founding members, invited guest speakers took part: Dr. Dwight Bashir, deputy director of USCIRF; Tina Ramirez, congressional fellow; Taniel Koushakjian, director of grassroots at the Armenian Assembly; and Pierro Tozzi, senior legal counsel at the Alliance Defense Fund.”

Religion Clause: “The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom last Friday wrote Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (full text of letter) urging that U.S. representatives to the United Nations raise religious freedom issues at this month’s Human Rights Council Universal Periodic Review session.”

Latest Posts

ADF Media: Alliance Defending Freedom asked the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit Monday to hear the case of Pennsylvania’s Geneva College, which is challenging a three-judge panel’s ruling that would force the Christian school to provide access to abortion pills as required by an Obama administration mandate.

Christian Examiner: Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel Kristen Waggoner, who represented Stutzman, said the judgment is just the “first punch,” financially. She expressed concerns that the ACLU, which is representing Ingersoll and Freed, will attempt to “financially devastate” Stutzman’s business and personal assets — including her retirement and personal savings.

PJ Media: Lawyers for the Alliance Defending Freedom argued that excluding worship services from “a broadly available public forum” discriminates against religion. The church, which has outgrown its own building, needs more space for special occasions and the nearby public school is the only place large enough that they can afford.